St. Stephen Special Series presents Organist Michael Hey

The St. Stephen Special Series, in conjunction with the Fort Worth Chapter of the American Guild of Organists, is pleased to welcome organist Michael Hey to St. Stephen Presbyterian Church.

 

Described as “flashy” and “exciting” (The American Organist, 2012), concert organist Michael Hey has been increasingly visible on U.S. and international concert stages. In 2010, he made his New York City debut in Alice Tully Hall performing Handel’s Organ Concerto #1 with the Juilliard Orchestra under Nicholas McGegan. In 2014 has was featured as organ soloist in the New York City Ballet’s newly commissioned work Acheron. Set to the music of Francis Poulenc’s Organ Concerto, Michael’s performance at its premiere was “vividly played” (The New York Times). Michael has been invited to perform solo organ recitals at the Lincoln Center (New York), the Kimmel Center (Philadelphia), and the Kennedy Center (Washington D.C.). Not exclusively a solo organist, Michael enjoys a widely varied career that includes collaborations with other musicians, solo piano recitals, vocal accompanying, and transcribing for organ and other instruments. He is now in the second season of performing with the Orchestra of St. Luke and the Paul Taylor Dance Company at Lincoln Center.

A native of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Michael Hey graduated in 2014 from the five-year degree program at The Juilliard School where he received both his Bachelor of Music and Master of Music degrees in organ performance under Paul Jacobs. Within one year of his graduation from Juilliard, he was appointed Assistant Director of Music and Organist of the famed St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City, where one of his first major tasks was to perform, as one of three organists, for Masses at St. Patrick’s Cathedral and Madison Square Garden for the first U.S. visit of Pope Francis.

A reception will follow the concert.

Michael Hey is represented exclusively in North America by Phillip Truckenbrod Concert Artists, LLC.

What the critics are saying about Michael Hey

“. . .vividly played.”

(The New York Times)

“Mr. Hey performed admirably, playing without a score in front of him and making the music seem improvisatory in the way that Handel might have played it.”

(Seen and Heard International)

“[Michael Hey blew] the dust and cobwebs out of the under-utilised pipes of the great Esplanade Klais organ. And he did it with relish, spicing things up with a wonderfully easy stage manner. He also tried to lighten Bach’s somewhat heavyweight G Minor Fantasia and Fugue with imaginative registration and flutterings of the swell pedal. This could have sent purists into paroxysms of rage, but it did much to captivate the Singapore audience. Best of all, he gave a glittering performance of Bach’s Wachet auf. It was crisp, clean, and enticingly communicative. A scintillating account of Scherzo Symphonique by the French composer Pierre Cochereau afforded Hey the opportunity to display not only his tremendous virtuosity, but also his fluent command of the instrument, as stops were pulled out and pushed in in a kaleidoscopic demonstration of the organ’s colours and qualities.”

(Marc Rochester, The Straits Times, Singapore, April 2016)